WHAT IS INIQUITY AND WHY DID JESUS HAVE TO BE BORN PERFECT?

WHAT IS INIQUITY AND WHY DID JESUS HAVE TO BE BORN PERFECT?

2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us: “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” And verse 18a tells us: “And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ.” How did Jesus, the Messiah, play a part in reconciling us to God?

 

A key to understanding how all this developed, is found in Psalm 103:3a, which says God “forgiveth all thine iniquities.” Iniquities are all the bad things that came from others in our past, passed down from generation to generation through our family’s DNA all the way back to the first human beings, Adam and Eve. Iniquities passed down are the left overs of all the sins and results of sins passed on to you through the blood. They are NOT you and God doesn’t want those iniquities to hang on to you!

 

He says He forgives them, and that means they can be utterly gone! Vanished forever! But He had to find a legal way to accomplish this and of course He already had it in mind.

 

Forgiving is not just saying, “I’m not going to look at it anymore; I’m just letting it go.” Nope, it doesn’t work that way.

 

The word, forgiving, is made up of two words, “for” and “giving.” God kept His own Word, as He always does. When it says “God forgiveth”, we must understand that it means God is in favor of giving. He gave his only begotten son, Jesus, a perfect human being with NO iniquity in his blood, because his blood came from God Almighty, Elohim the creator!

 

Only a human being with a perfect bloodline, could take on the iniquities and be a substitute for all of us! God gave all that iniquity from all generations, and He was “for” “giving” it all to Jesus, because He knew that a perfect human had to be sacrificed for the generational sins that the devil inflicted on all humanity. And Jesus had to be born into the earth even from conception to birth as a tiny baby, to cover for all iniquity that would already be developing in the embryo.

 

We say, “But a baby is so innocent!” Yes, but all human babies are born with issues; they’re called iniquities. They usually don’t present until later in life but they are already there. We know that as innocent as a baby is, there is a sin nature in the blood and even babies need to be reared in a Godly way until they can understand spiritual matters and can make ethical choices for God and against the devil. I’ve been told that the age a child can begin to understand things outside of the natural is usually around eight years old.

 

But God tells us right away in Genesis 8:21 that children are not born innocent. “And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in his heart, ‘I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.’”

 

God said He wouldn’t do another flood to wipe out humanity, but He did give us a way to escape from evil, and that’s to accept Jesus Christ as Lord and release all our sin and iniquity that Jesus already knew about and took to the cross to be destroyed so that we could be free.

 

God tells us the raw truth in Isaiah 53:6 “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him [Jesus] the iniquity of us all.” It had to be done this way.

 

God puts meaning to every word He’s inspired to be written in His Holy Bible. And it’s interesting that in Isaiah 53:5b He says: “He [Jesus] was bruised for our iniquities.” A bruise is when there is bleeding that is under the skin, in a sense, hidden, not blood that is not freely spurting out or running out on the surface, and that’s how iniquity is, under the surface, and we are often unaware of personal tendencies toward sins and iniquities that have been passed down to us from past generations.

 

But once we see those iniquities, we can call them out! We recognize what they are and why they are, and we don’t have to carry out any of it anymore. Jesus came to earth as a tiny baby so that he could take every single thing that attacks us from conception to death, he took it, and it doesn’t belong to us, so we can throw it back at the devil, where it originated and where it belongs! No more false thinking, wrong reactions, demonic influences, weaknesses of will – ALL of the fleshly garbage and all of the demonic pestering from within, gone in Christ!

 

God knows that almost every addiction comes from a false choice for some relief, almost every act of disobedience to God is because of learned mistrust and fear of rejection, and stubbornness from fear of someone putting you in bondage or oppression of some sort. God knows better than anyone why we made the choices we did; it was in the blood, and when we chose wrongly, He was already ready to forgive. But we had to ask.

 

Jesus willingly came to earth and knew he would have to take it all. It was the only way we could get rid of generational sins and iniquities, and be redeemed back to God. Jesus, like every human, had a choice, and he chose to save us. Jesus chose God’s way, unlike Adam, who chose his own, which in reality was not his own, but the one originated by the devil himself. The devil’s plans were and still are to destroy the earth and the humans God created.

But Jesus also knew that for himself and for us, even the worst thing the devil could do to us, which the devil thought was death, would not have to be destruction, if we only believed God’s truth.

 

So, our God offered Jesus. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved” (Rom. 10:9).

 

Jesus chose to take our place, and he suffered all that people would ever suffer here on earth! But he was raised from the dead, as we will be too. And when we believe in Jesus and take him for our Lord, all sin and iniquity is wiped out and we become new, able to grow in faith, love, and wisdom throughout the rest of our lives if we so choose. So, every day we can choose God’s ways.

 

“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things [these new things] are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation” (2 Cor. 5:17-18).

 

Love, Carolyn

 

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MERRY CHRISTMAS

 

Have a wonderful Christmas celebrating the birth of our God’s only begotten son, Jesus the Messiah

Love, Carolyn.

HONORING GOD, JESUS, AND EACH OTHER

HONORING  GOD, JESUS, AND EACH OTHER

At a Christmas party many years ago, I was honored with a special hardhat and a $1000 travel voucher, for ten years of continuous service as a mural painter and faux finisher. I had no idea I was getting it, so the blessing was especially sweet.

 

Since my best friend Jane passed away recently, I was thinking a lot about how to honor her life. I wanted to do something to honor her for being such a blessing to me all those years we were roommates and best friends.

 

She carried many spiritual anointings that I benefitted from, and I felt that God was saying to me that He didn’t want those anointings to be lost to the world. So, I felt the best way to honor Jane would be to make sure the wonderful anointings she had didn’t go missing, so I asked God: “Could I have a double portion of Jane’s anointings like You gave Elisha when Elijah passed away?” And He showed me that His answer was “Yes, you can!”

 

I was astonished, but within just a day or so after I asked, I found that I was exhibiting some spiritual anointings that I’d never experienced before. I had new wisdom in the natural and the spiritual, like Jane did. I had the ability to speak easily “off the cuff”; it just rolled out, where as before, I was a person who mulled things over and had difficulty speaking clearly and easily on the spur of the moment. But Jane could.

 

Jane had a very close relationship with God that she called “the portal.” She said God would open the windows of Heaven, like it says in Malachi 3:10 (the portal), and He would give her something to pray about. She immediately prayed it back to Him through the open portal, and almost immediately the answer came—within a day or two, at most, a week! I’ve been experiencing that like an automatic rifle going off with so many rounds so fast I can barely keep up!! There’s more, and I know it sounds a little weird, but the things of God that sound weird are often the supernatural things that He has already told us about in His Word, but maybe we thought that they couldn’t happen to us. But they do!

 

The shepherds in the hills around Bethlehem got an amazing visitation by a host of angels. They were honored for their believing in the coming Messiah, and the angels honored them by telling them to go and see for themselves. They were among the very first to witness the Christ child!

 

The shepherds went to honor God after they experienced the visitation of the angels. Then God honored them, bringing them into the presence of Mary, Joseph, and the baby who was the one prophesied about throughout the Old Testament as the Messiah, the son of God coming into the world to save those who would believe.  

 

The shepherds were “abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night” (Luke 2:8). The angel of the Lord came and told them that they were in the right place at the right time and it was to them that this blessing had come.

 

How often are we going about our normal routines, endeavoring to do God’s will the best we can, and all of a sudden, we meet someone new who really blesses our lives? Or we’re inspired to get in a certain grocery line and end up blessing a total stranger? We end up in the right place at the right time to either be blessed or be a blessing. Hebrews 13:2 even tells us we should “be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”

 

That’s what happened to the shepherds. They were in the hills by Bethlehem and that’s where God wanted them. The angel of God found them and told them the good news. “And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.  And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2: 9-11).

This event brought “glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men” (v.14). The shepherds went down into the city of Bethlehem to witness this for themselves.

 

The Bible doesn’t say anything about them honoring Jesus with physical gifts like the wise men did later on, but the shepherds honored Jesus by telling people what the angel told them and what they actually witnessed themselves. That’s how they honored God—by telling other people about the great things God did and that they had witnessed the baby who was the prophesied Messiah!

 

“And when they [the shepherds] had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child.  And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them” (Luke 2: 17,18 and 20).

 

Gift-giving originated with God too. Right after God created Adam, He gave him a gift. “And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Gen. 2: 8-9).

 

The idea of honoring God and others, came straight from our creator and has happily invaded all cultures of the world.

 

This Christmas let’s think about honoring each with our gifts and our respect. And most of all, let’s give some special attention to how we can honor God and our Savior, Christ the Lord.

 

Have a wonderful Christmas!

 

Love, Carolyn

 

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"FOR GOODNESS SAKE"

“FOR GOODNESS SAKE”

My grandma would say, “Oh, for goodness sake” when she thought someone was making too big of a deal over something, or being overly critical of someone. “For goodness sake, stop talking like that.” What seemed to be just a saying, is straight from the Bible. It is for the sake of God’s goodness to us and in us, that we need to be less critical of others and ourselves as well.

 

There was a guy at work that was starting to really annoy me. He just didn’t ever seem to pay attention to the directions we were given. I asked Fred, “How do you handle this guy who can’t seem to remember things from minute to minute?” He replied, “It’s easy. When I see that his mind is wandering, I alert him, get his eyes focused on me and remind him of what we’re doing. And he answers, ‘Oh yeah, that’s right,’ and we carry on.” Wow! He made it sound so easy, and for him it was. Fred was a perfect example of what the goodness of God is like.

 

In Exodus 33:18 Moses asks God: “I beseech thee, show me thy glory.” “And the LORD [Jehovah] said unto Moses, I will do this thing also that thou hast spoken: for thou hast found grace in my sight, and I know thee by name” (Exod.33:17).

 

But instead of the Lord showing Moses the fanfare, the bells and whistles, and spectacular fireworks, he said: “I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy” (v. 19). And that’s just what Fred did with our co-worker; he showed graciousness and mercy: God’s goodness.

 

There are so many great examples in the Bible of God’s goodness. In 1 Kings 8:65 to 66 shows us that God’s goodness extended into a 14-day feast! And after the feast, “he sent the people away: and they thanked the king, and went unto their tents joyful and glad of heart for all the goodness that the Lord had done for David his servant, and for Israel his people.” The goodness of God included substance. In this case, food, merriment, music, dancing, and joyful thanksgiving for all God had done for His people.

 

Another example of God’s goodness is more like what I had seen at work. Here we see in action how David treated Saul as an individual. God’s goodness is overflowing in mercy. Saul had been given instructions from God, but Saul didn’t follow through and ended up opening his mind to a demon. The only thing that brought Saul back to his right mind was music.

 

Saul’s servants found David, who could play the harp. “And it came to pass, when the evil spirit was upon Saul, that David took a harp, and played with his hand: So Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him” (1 Sam. 16:23).

 

David was called on to play for Saul many times, but as the demon took over more and more of Saul’s mind, he got jealous of David and this is what happened:

 

“And David played with his hand, as at other times: and there was a javelin in Saul’s hand. And Saul cast the javelin; for he said, I will smite David even to the wall with it. And David avoided out of his presence twice” (1 Sam. 18:10-11). David was good to Saul in spite of Saul’s mental case. He stayed merciful and good to Saul until he couldn’t stay any longer.

 

The last time Saul tried to kill David with the javelin, “the evil spirit was upon Saul, as he sat in his house with his javelin in his hand: and David played. And Saul sought to smite David even to the wall with the javelin; but he slipped away out of Saul’s presence, and he smote the javelin into the wall: and David fled and escaped that night” (1 Sam. 19:9-10).

 

As it turns out, Saul was so mad that he got his troops together and chased after David to kill him. David always escaped. Then at one point when Saul and his three thousand men were camped for the night, David and his friend Abishai snuck up on them. Abishai wanted to kill Saul.

 

But David said, “Destroy him not; for who can stretch forth his hand against the Lord’s anointed, and be guiltless?” (1 Sam. 26:9).

 

“David said furthermore, ‘As the Lord liveth the Lord shall smite him; or his day shall come to die; or he shall descend into battle, and perish. But I pray thee, take thou now the spear that is at his bolster, and the cruse of water, and let us go” (1 Sam 26:10-11).

 

David was convinced of the goodness of God and he would not kill one who God had made king. But he did take Saul’s spear and water to show him later that he could have killed him if he wanted to.

 

Saul finally came to his right mind and must have rebuked one of the devils that was controlling him: “Then said Saul, ‘I have sinned: return my son David: for I will no more do thee harm, because my soul was precious in thine eyes this day: behold, I have played the fool, and have erred exceedingly” (1 Sam. 26:21).

 

What an amazing lesson for us. In the New Testament Paul prays for us: “That our God would count you worthy of this calling, and fulfil all the good pleasure of HIS GOODNESS” (2 Thess. 1:11).  WOW! It’s our duty, privilege, and blessing to exhibit God’s goodness to people.

 

We never know the extent of trouble or grief a person is going through. 1 Corinthians 2:11 says: “For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of the man which is in him?” (1 Cor. 2:11). So, making an effort to be kinder is a good thing. Being less critical is a good thing. Better to err on the side of goodness. The LORD will show us if, or when we need to stop.

 

And it’s good to be gentler and kinder to ourselves as well. Sometimes we could be going through things we’re not even fully aware of. No matter how we’ve been in the past, or even yesterday, we can be as full of the goodness of God as we allow right now. We can let Him fill us up with His goodness and distribute that goodness to others.

 

The examples I gave are just two of the ways God exhibits His goodness, and I’m sure you can find many more examples as well. Here we saw goodness in the form of mercy like with my work friend, Moses, and David with Saul, and we saw an example of the substance kind of goodness with God providing an amazing, over the top feast for His people in 1 Kings 8:65-66.

 

Like it says in Romans 2:4: “Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?” It’s His goodness that brought Him to us and His goodness that brought us to Him. Let’s be the bearers of His goodness, “full of goodness” (Rom. 15:14) and spread it around.

 

Love, Carolyn

 

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JEHOVAH-JIREH, HE SEES AND PROVIDES

 JEHOVAH-JIREH, HE SEES AND PROVIDES

When I opened up my new box of Christmas cards, the thing that struck my heart the loudest was in the verse on the inside, Luke 2:7: “And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn.”

 

“No room for them in the inn”?!! Even though Mary was obviously ready to give birth, no one offered them a room, or traded them sleeping quarters, or even room to share—not much empathy there for a very pregnant mother!

 

No room for them. The majority of Hebrew people who showed up in Bethlehem to pay taxes were housed, comfortable, warm, and had provisions, but the holy couple were alone, and treated as strangers. Joseph and Mary knew who they were, knew their special gifts; had not the angel of God come to Mary and tell her she had a very special anointing, to birth the Christ child?! And yet so very few even recognized who they were.

 

Maybe you’ve felt like that at times; not honored? unrecognized? alone? Even with all those Hebrew believers around, so few responded. Later in life, Jesus spoke: “And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear” (Matt. 11:14).

 

And with Joseph and Mary it was the shepherds in the nearby hills who had ears to hear, and came to worship the savior of the world, the light of God, the gift of purity, excellence, and everlasting life right before their eyes in this tiny baby; a baby so perfect, how could he not be the most astonishing and beautiful baby those shepherds had ever seen in their lives? 

 

And the shepherds were even blessed with a host of angels showing up in all their majesty, “a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men’” (Luke 2: 13b-14). An amazing episode for the shepherds and for Mary and Joseph, too!

 

This story makes me think of one of the names for God from the Old Testament, Jehovah-jireh, the God who sees and provides. And indicated in this name is that He provides the uncommon, the unusual, the unexpected. Certainly, the shepherds didn’t expect angels, and Mary and Joseph didn’t expect a group of shepherds to show up and be so excited about the birth of their son. But that’s how wonderfully our God works.

 

The first place this name, Jehovah-jireh, is used is with Abraham (Gen. 22:1-14), when God asked if he was willing to sacrifice his son Isaac, and because Abraham was in covenant with God and had total trust in Him, he got as far as pulling out his knife! But Jehovah-jireh, the God who sees and provides, stopped Abraham, and gave him a ram to sacrifice instead.

 

When none of their Hebrew brethren in Bethlehem recognized Joseph and Mary’s anointing, our God, Jehovah-jireh, saw and provided the most unusual greeting. The shepherds came and they even got to experience the existence of a host of magnificent angels!

 

When it seems like sometimes there is no room at the inn for us, we never despair, because God sees our hearts committed to Him in the best way we know how, and He does not forget His covenant with us. Jehovah-jireh sees and provides.

“Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!” (Psa.107:8).

 

Have a wonderful Christmas!

 

Love, Carolyn

 

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